


Teeth

by nikkithedead



Category: Stand By Me (1986), Stephen King - Fandom, The Body - Stephen King
Genre: Canonical Character Death, First Kiss, First Love, Future Character Death, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-14
Updated: 2017-03-14
Packaged: 2018-10-05 04:30:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10297556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nikkithedead/pseuds/nikkithedead
Summary: In the summer of 1959, Gordie LaChance had his first kiss.





	

  
No one ever asked Gordie why he thought it had happened. Of course they hadn't, because not a single living human knew a thing about it. They'd asked about it in round about ways, without having any clue what they were stepping upon.

They'd say to him, casually, "So, Gordo, who was your first kiss with?"

Or "You ever been in love, Gordie?"

He never lied when these questions were asked. Not once.

At the end of grammar school, the very first day of summer vacation he had kissed Sissy White on the mouth, at Bev Perkins birthday party. It had been the very first boy/girl party he'd ever attended, and though he would have gone to an early grave before he admitted it, he'd been nervous as hell. When Bev had pulled out the old wine bottle she'd snuck from her folks, Gordie had been ready to chuck all over her stupid pink party dress. He could imagine the horror on Bev's face, practically smell the sour vomit dripping with half digested hors d'oeuvres. 

The thought of it had actually given him a pretty good idea for a story.

Somehow, he managed to keep the finger food down, and the party proceeded uninhibited.

They sat in a circle, alternating boy, girl, boy, girl. More than anything, Gordie wished he had not come. Wasn't planning to, since receiving the invitation from her a month before school was out. That was, until Chris and Teddy got wind of it.

Neither of them had been invited, which Gordie personally thought had been poor planning on Bev's fault. If there was one way to guarantee those two attended a social function, it was not to invite them. Those they were invited to, they tended not to bother with.

And so about an hour into the party, the back door to Bev's rec room had slid open and in waltzed Chris and Teddy, grinning ear to ear as if they couldn't notice the horrified look on Bev's face.

Chris has even brought her a present. Gordie wondered through out the party where he'd got it from, and later discovered it was an old doll he'd found in a dumpster, with one eye missing and a cigarette burn where the mouth should have been.

Perhaps, if Chris has not been there when Bev pulled out the bottle, Gordie may have left. Faked an illness, perhaps a stomach ulcer or a sudden fit. But Chris had been there, and there was no way Gordie was going waiver in front of him. Plus, Teddy would have told everyone what a pussy he was, and he had somewhat of a reputation to uphold.

So they all sat in a circle, him, Chris, Teddy and Vern, who looked just as horrified as Gordie felt. In between each of them was a girl, whose facial expressions ranged from disturbed to horrified. Clearly they did not approve of this arrangement either.

The bottle was spun, and Bev, who had taken it upon herself to go first, landed on Kathy Wilkes. The two girls twisted up their faces, and shook their heads. Clearly, this was an unspoken rule. In the game of forcing unwilling participants to kiss each other, that was going too far.

Bev spun again, and this time landed on Chris. She looked only slightly less happy than when it had landed on Kathy. Chris, however, grinned and leaned forward. He had never been one to back down from a challenge, after all.

"You haven't been smoking today, have you?" Bev asked, ever so cautiously leaning forward.

Chris' grin widened. "Yeah, but I ate some tootsie rolls after so I wouldn't worry," he reassured her.

Bev sighed disdainfully. "Alright then," she said. "If we must."

Chris raised an eyebrow. "This is your game, remember? If you don't like it, toss it."

Apparently the suggestion was more offensive to Bev then anything else he could have said. She swelled indignantly, and pointed her finger in Chris' face. "Listen here, Chambers, this is my party and we're going to do things the way I want to do them, do you understand me?"

Chris glanced at Gordie for a moment, and the two exchanged a look. Women.

"Yeah, alright," Chris said.

Bev look smug. "Good."

Chris snuck one more look to Gordie before leaning in the rest of the way to Bev. This time though it didn't seem as amusing. In fact, there was a sort of tightness in Gordie's chest, like for a moment he couldn't quite catch his breath. He wondered if he was really having a fit after all.

Bev and Chris kissed, faster than the average person blinks. They split apart lightning quick and returned to their respective seats, each looking unimpressed.

Taking a moment to compose herself, Bev smiled and looked to the girl next to her to take her turn.

They game went on. In turn, Vern and Teddy each had to kiss someone, though Gordie didn't even notice when they did. He was still thinking about Chris' kiss, and the terrible feeling in his chest when he'd watched his lips touch Bev's.

"Hello? Earth to Gordie?"

Gordie snapped out of his thoughts and realized everyone was staring at him. It took him a moment to put it together. With trepidation, he looked down and saw the bottle pointing straight at him. A lump formed in his throat as he looked up and locked eyes with Sissy White, the girl who'd spun the bottle.

"Uh..." He'd managed to stammer.

"Come on, get a move on!" Somebody urged, giving him a shove forwards. He stumbled to his knees, and leaned in to the circle. His heart was pounding in his chest.

Sissy moved to her knees as well, and Gordie could see she was blushing.

All on their own, his eyes slid to where Chris sat. Something about him struck Gordie, something he hadn't noticed before. What was it? Something different? Not quite, but he couldn't put his finger on it.

Chris smiled at him, and nodded gently. You can do this, Gordo, he seemed to say. Gordie tried to tell him that he really couldn't.

Feeling a hand on his chest, Gordie turned back to Sissy and was met with a pair of pink lips shoved against his own. His eyebrows shot up in surprise as she kissed him, her mouth pushed into an almost comical pucker. Years later, when she learned what kissing was really supposed to be like, her first kiss would be a great source of embarrassment to her.

The kiss was over quickly, or at least Gordie would later realize it was. In the moment it had seemed to go on forever and ever, and for a moment he had been sure the party was going to end and everyone else was going to go home and there'd he still be, sitting on the floor sucking face with Sissy White.

Sissy's lips were sticky with some kind of gloss, and they tasted sickly sweet, like frosting on a cake. She smelt strongly of perfume, as if she'd poured the whole bottle over her head or something.

Kissing Sissy in front of everyone like that, breathing in her overwhelming scent and feeling her sticky lips on his, Gordie realized something: Chris had washed his shirt. He was wearing his favourite blue and white baseball tee, the one he wore at least twice a week. It was always dirty, always covered in smudges of dirt or baring evidence of the last thing Chris had eaten.

But today, it was clean as a whistle. Not a stain in sight.

He remembered Chris laughing, telling him he was going to crash Bev's party. The wicked grin on his face, talking about how funny it would be. But despite the gag gift, despite the wicked grin and laughter... Here he was with a newly washed shirt.

They pulled apart and Sissy smiled at him, but Gordie hardly saw her. He went back to his seat, thinking about Chris. Had he really wanted to come today? Not just for a laugh, not just to rib Bev... but really wanted to?

But that was ridiculous, wasn't it? Why in Jesus' good name would Chris Chambers, who never get a rats ass about doing what everyone else was doing, want to spend his valuable time yucking it up with the losers from their class? Hell, he barely wanted to spend time with them during school, when they had to. So why would he want to spend his free time, when he could be off at their clubhouse enjoying a smoke with Teddy, instead crammed into Bev's basement chatting about the latest adventure of Nancy Drew?

Now, truth be told, Gordie himself didn't mind those stories so much--although the Hardy boys were arguably better--but that was hardly the point.

Chris has better things to do, he was sure, then waste his time with the likes of Bev Perkins, or feebs like Stan Marsh, whom poor Kathy Wilkes was now being forced to kiss. Well, they were either kissing, or Stan had finally snapped and was eating Kathy's face. Either way, she did not look pleased. Gordie thought she would have been better off kissing Bev.

The game of spin the bottle ended shortly after Kathy and Stan's turn, when Bev's mom entered the basement and Bev hastily hid the bottle under the couch. Bev's mom brought down Bev's birthday cake, a pink monstrosity covered with so many iced flowers that Gordie had to wonder if there was any actual cake under there.

After Bev was seranaded with a heartless, tuneless rendition of "Happy birthday," the cake was cut and served. Gordie hung back from the crowd of kids clamouring for cake, not feeling entirely hungry.

"Hey, swiped you some," Chris said, appearing at his elbow with two pieces. He grinned at Gordie, but it slipped away when he saw he looked upset. "Whatsamatter, Lachance?"

Gordie shook his head, not even sure he could have told Chris what was wrong if He'd wanted to.

Chris nudged him gently his his elbow. "I know, it's Sissy, ain't it? You got a taste of the good stuff and now you're jonsing for more."

Gordie made a face, and Chris grinned, the devilish look of someone clearly teasing. Slowly Gordie felt himself begin to smile as well, and a moment later they had both burst out laughing.

"Hey, what's so funny? What're you guys laughing about, huh?"

Vern had wandered over, cake in hand and frosting on his face, and as usual had no idea what was going on.

"Nothing," Chris said, shaking his head. To avoid saying anything more, he took a bite of his cake. His face froze slightly, and he blinked.

"No good?" Gordie guessed.

With what appeared to be some difficulty, Chris swallowed. "Tastes like pink."

Vern shrugged, and took another forkful of his own piece. "Well, I like it. It's good stuff."

Gordie and Chris exchanged looks at this, and once more burst out laughing.

  
***

The party ended close ten o'clock at night, but Teddy got them kicked out shortly after cake was served, by accidentally lighting his shirt on fire. By the way Bev-- and then Bev's mother-- reacted, you'd have thought his entire shirt had gone up in flames. From what Gordie had been able to tell, one candle (he had been holding them in his mouth, for some reason or another) had fallen onto his chest and burnt a small hole in the shirt before burning out. But to the Perkins', he might as well have tried to set the dog on fire.

The night still being young, and none of them looking forward to returning to their homes, they decided to stay out until their folks would be expecting them home from the party. It was then just a question of what to do. No one could agree: Teddy wanted to go Kings Arcade, and was eventually able to get Vern on board (Vern had been initially hesitant, having still not found the quart jar of penny's he'd buried under his porch, but was keen to go once Teddy reminded him he knew how to rig at least four different games into giving them free plays).

Chris just wanted to go back to the clubhouse and kill some time in peace, and frankly that plan sounded a hell of a lot more appealing to Gordie then watching Teddy lose his temper at the arcade machines when he inevitably could not get them to give him free games like he always seemed to think he could.

Eventually it was decided that their group would split in two, and Teddy and Vern would go to the arcade, while Gordie and Chris would head to the clubhouse. Gordie was more than fine with this arrangement.

They walked to the clubhouse in relative silence, making the occasional idle comment here and there.

It wasn't until they were actually at the clubhouse, settling back against the mouldy wooden walls, that Chris brought it up.

"So, what was up with you, at the party?" Chris asked. He held up a deck of cards and raised an eyebrow, but Gordie didn't feel much like playing. Chris shrugged and began dealing himself a game of solitaire.

"It was nothing," Gordie mumbled, not feeling much like talking about it.

Chris looks up at him. "Was it Denny? I know you're still messed up about that. If you want to talk--"

"It had nothing to do with Denny," Gordie said, a bit too harshly. He didn't mean to snap at Chris, but Denny was the last thing he wanted to think about right now. Looking back, he thought it might have been because with all the confusion running wild in his head, Denny was exactly the one person he would have wanted to talk to, about all the bullshit he was thinking and feeling. If anyone would have been able to sort it all out, make sense of it, it would have been Denny.

But Denny would never be there to help him with anything, ever again. Never be able to tease him, about kissing Sissy White. Never be able to help him prepare for his next boy/girl party, or the one after that...

Gordie sighed. "Chris, did you want to come to the party today?" He asked.

Chris shrugged, pulling out a cigarette. He stuck it between his lips and dug in his pocket for some matches. "I mean, sure I did. For a laugh--"

"That's not what I mean." He said quietly. Chris looked up. "Did you want to come?"

Chris was silent for a moment. He found his matches in his pocket and lit his cigarette. He took a puff from it, then blew out the smoke slowly. "Yeah," he said, barely loud enough for Gordie to hear. "I guess so."

"Why?" Gordie asked. "I mean, it was a dumb party with a bunch of losers and girls. Why would you wanna waste your time--"

"Did you know that the whole grade got an invitation?" Chris interrupted. "Everyone in our whole grade, even guys like Vern and Stan Marsh, they all got invited. The only two people who didn't? Me and Teddy."

Chris paused, taking another drag from his cigarette. "Now, Teddy I understand. He once stood under the bleachers to look up Bev's skirt. So I get him not being invited... But I never did a thing to Bev. Hell, last year we had a project in school to work on together, and we didn't even do so bad. I thought... I don't know. I didn't mind her, and I thought she didn't mind me so much."

He passed the cigarette to Gordie, who took a long drag. He hadn't considered that. "You guys were really the only two?" He asked. Chris nodded. "What about Willy Denborough? He wasn't there either."

"He's home sick. Some kind of weird flu or something. And Rosie Jenkins wasn't allowed to come, 'cause her parents thought she was too young for a boy/girl party. I heard her complaining about it a few weeks ago."

"Oh..."

Gordie took another puff, then handed the cigarette back to Chris.

"Yeah," Chris muttered. "Oh."

He was quiet again. Gordie waited for him to continue, but nothing further came. Gordie thought he understood, though, what Chris was saying. A guy like Teddy had to act like a pervert to earn his reputation as a hooligan, unworthy of an invitation. But Chris? All he'd had to do was be born into the Chambers family and that was it for him. He was a hooligan for life, branded as one of those low life Chambers kids forever.

A little while before school had ended for the summer vacation, Chris had gotten his own three day vacation for stealing the milk money at school. Sometimes Gordie wondered why he'd done it; did he really want the money, or had it just been his way of living up to the great expectations placed on him. Chris was no thief, Gordie knew that. He wasn't a hooligan, or a low-life. But somehow he knew that if the people of Castle Rock had their way, he would end up one just the same.

The thought of it broke Gordie's heart.

Looking at Chris, watching him slowly smoking his cigarette, Gordie had it in his mind to tell him what he was thinking. He wanted to him that he was better than all of them, better than Bev and her stupid party. Better than his brother and his father, better than his whole damn family.

Better than their entire town, and everything they thought of him.

With Denny gone and his parents still reeling from the shock of it, Chris was, in a way, all he had left.

"So, that kiss with Sissy, eh?" Chris went on, blowing smoke out of the corner of his mouth. "How was it, really?" He grinned slightly.

Gordie frowned. "Sticky," he said. "She had some gunk on her lips, it tasted awful."

Chris snickered. "Yeah, Bev did too. Still, can't say much against her. She's probably sitting around with a group of her friends right now talking about how bad kissing me was."

"Kissing you was probably better than kissing Sissy," Gordie replied. "I don't think she knew what she was doing."

"Oh, and you do, Casanova?" Chris asked. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that was first kiss, from a girl who's not your own mother."

Gordie shrugged. "Don't matter. Some things just come naturally," he said, flashing Chris a teasing grin. "I have a technique."

Chris laughed, and snuffed out his cigarette on the bottom of his shoe. "Oh, that I have to get in on," he said, sitting up. Gordie stared at him, wondering what he meant. "Come on then, Lachance. Lay it on me."

"What?"

"That 'technique' of yours, I gotta experience it first hand, man!" Chris said, slapping his shoulder. "I mean, here I've been doing it one way and you're over there holding out on me. So come on, show me what I've been doing wrong." He grinned wickedly, and Gordie realized he was joking.

"Oh, sure," Gordie replied, refusing to back down from Chris' taunt. "Well, it might be a little advanced for you," he said, moving forward. "You might have trouble keeping up, but I'll go slow for you,"

"Yes, please," Chris said, putting on an exaggerated breathy voice. "Don't hurt me, Gordon." He leaned in, batting his eyelashes and making a pucker bigger than Sissy's. Gordie laughed, and Chris' face split into a grin. He shoved Gordie's arm playfully, and Gordie fell forward, laughing so hard there was a pain in his side. He rested his head on Chris' shoulder, breathing in his smokey scent as he waited for the laughter to subside.

Lifting his head and wiping away a tear, Gordie looked up at Chris and saw he suddenly appeared quite serious. He stared back at Gordie with a look of concentration on his face, the kind he had when he was considering a particularly difficult problem. Gordie was about to open his mouth and ask him what was wrong, when Chris did something pretty unexpected: he leaned in and kissed Gordie on the mouth.

The kiss was he opposite of the one with Sissy. That one had seemed to go on forever, but had only been a moment. This one, however long it went on for, seemed to be Gordie to be over much too fast. He had no time to think, process or react. It was over far too quickly for him to do anything other than sit there, somewhat stunned.

When Chris pulled back, Gordie could see his face was red as a beet. He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand, and looked away.

"Chris..." The word stuck in Gordie's throat, hoarse as if he had a cold.

"Forget it," Chris muttered. He wouldn't look anywhere in Gordie's direction. "It was stupid, forget it..."

"No... Chris..."

"I said forget it!" Chris snapped, pulling away. Gordie stared at him, the anger and fear on his best friends face. A moment ago he'd kissed him, not as a joke, not because Bev Perkins had forced him too with a wine bottle... But because he had wanted to. He'd kissed him, so quickly, and now he was going to storm off and refuse to talk about it again. Gordie could see it coming, and knew he could not let that happen.

Heart beating faster than Gordie had known it could, Gordie grabbed a handful of Chris' shirt and yanked him forward again. He could see a look of surprise on Chris' face for a moment before Gordie slammed his mouth against him. And after the moment of surprise had passed, Gordie felt Chris kiss him back.

The kiss was painful, would leave Gordie's lips raw and chapped. It was too hard and too frantic, desperate, almost... But it was everything Gordie had wanted his first kiss to be.

It tasted like cigarettes and tootsie rolls.

They pulled back slowly and looked at each other. Chris looked afraid, and that both frightened Gordie himself and made him sad at the same time. He wanted to tell Chris it would be okay, that he didn't need to be afraid of this. That Gordie would protect him, the way he had always protected Gordie.

Gordie could feel Chris' hand shaking slightly as he lifted it and placed it against Gordie's cheek, pulling him in once more. Gordie opened his mouth a bit, the way he had seen adults kiss in the movies. Chris did the same and their teeth clanked together, scraping and biting as they tried to figure out what they were doing. Chris' teeth scraped his lip and he gasped slightly, in pain.

"Shit, sorry--" Chris mumbled, pulling back.

"No, no-- I don't care--" Gordie insisted, chasing after Chris, not wanting to stop.

Chris' eyes were on Gordie's mouth. "You're bleeding..."

"I don't care..." Gordie repeated, wiping the blood off on the back of his hand. It was just a dot, barely anything.

Gently, Chris ran his thumb over The small cut on Gordie's lip. "I don't want to hurt you, man." He said quietly. He kissed him, softly.

Gordie knew he wouldn't.

He had read about kissing before, in the many books he'd taken out from the castle rock public library. All of them, he knew now, had gotten it wrong. In the books when the two main characters kissed, they said it was if the whole world stopped. Like they were the only people that existed anymore, and all the stars and the planets, they revolved around them.

But kissing Chris, alone and up high in their club house, it wasn't like that, not exactly. The rest of the world, Gordie still knew it existed. Vern, Teddy, his parents, they were still all there. It was just that none of them mattered. Not in that moment.

At that moment, it was only Chris. Everyone else was far away, faded into the background like the staticky picture on a bad television. Black and white, fiction. And Chris was the only thing in colour, the only thing part of the real world.

Years later, when everything was over and he had grown up and gotten married, whenever anyone would ask him about his first kiss he would tell the story of Sissy White and her ridiculous frosted lips and silly pucker face. He would talk about how it had been the scariest, longest moment of his entire life. The story was usually good for a laugh; it had been pretty funny, and Gordie told it well.

But in his mind, Gordie knew the truth. His first kiss, his real first kiss had happened in the club house, with his best friend in the world. He thought, sometimes, about telling the truth someday, or even writing about it in his story about them, and the summer they'd found the body of Ray Brower. But he didn't, and he never would.

Not because he was ashamed, or afraid... But because it wasn't for anyone else. That kiss had been between him and Chris.

Even after Chris was gone, it had always been the same. The rest of the world existed, people came into his life and played their part and Gordie loved them all for it... But it was Chris who had mattered. And when he thought of him and his childhood, he would always be the only thing in colour.

  
***

_  
"Love has teeth; they bite;_ _the wounds never close. No word, no combination of words, can close those lovebites."_

_\--Stephen King, The Body_

 

 


End file.
